Jinny-2

We lived in chennai when we brought our Jinny boy home.Our house was a road away from the Eliots beach,with an enormous garden.The first night we brought him home,all of us sat around him in a circle and stared at him like a specimen in a formalin jar.The thing was, he gave us tough competition by staring right back at us.Now when I think back,it was almost like one of those Matrix scenes,everyone frozen in their places.Thus,the naming ceremony began.

Amma suggested names like Vittal,Ramanujam,Ananthagopalan,Muralikrishna and the likes.Appa kept fervently nodding at whatever she said in the hope that if he encouraged her,she might actually come up with short,real doggy names.My brother and I were plainly disgusted.When Shaarangapani came along,we couldn't take it anymore.We protested animatedly and told her she would soon be out of the naming game if this continued.Every single standard dog name got thrown in like Pluto,Snowy,Browny,whitey,Brutus,Fluffy and what not.All were eventually discarded because none of these names remotely justified his unique profile.Jinny meanwhile got bored and started chasing his little tail.Finally my brother came up with the brilliant suggestion 'genie'.I was at a stage where anything my brother said was impressive and gospel.I raised my voice,both my hands,cried genie to the skies and registered him in. The purity of the name lasted all of 24 hrs.We South Indians have a huge penchant for stressing syllables.My grandmother couldn't pronounce genie.She tried cheenee,chinny and other phonetically similar words.And so finally we umm...radicals had to succumb to genie's degradation to Jinny.

Jinny was such a loving pup.He would wake us up every morning and we played with him till we had to get ready for school.In the evening we would run back from our bus stops and he would be waiting eagerly at the gates.He was new,intersting and exciting.We felt responsible for him and in those responsibilites our love grew. Since he was our first pet,we had to learn how to hold him,what to feed him and how to bathe him.He was full of energy and life.We would all run to the beach and spend hours there playing.In those silent,sultry,summer nights my parents sat outside on the porch after dinner while we 3 played in the garden.Ran around one another,Jinny weaving between our legs and tripping all of us.He established a hierarchy very soon.My mother held alpha position,followed by my dad.My brother,he considered serious competition and a threat to his position and I....well,I really didn't figure. :-) He dismissed me as a harmless insect on the very first night.

Those days,when Jinny was growing up,appa never wore socks or banyans I think.Because Jinny would hunt specifically for them in the laundry pile,pick them up and run into the garden to bury it in some remote corner.No matter where we hid those socks they would end up buried in the garden looking very dead and useless.We tried giving him cheweys and biscuits to bury but none of them held the attraction like a pair of socks.Why he did this,we could never fathom. Some canine quirk I guess!!

One day when we took him for a walk along the beach road,Jinny met Spotty.Spotty was a huge black and white, over friendly, fluffy fellow.They met like long lost brothers.There was a lot of shrill barking,wagging of tails,jumping and fur flying everywhere.It was a reunion of sorts.Some days later we saw Jinny sitting near the gate in serious conversation with Spotty who was sitting across him on the other side of the gate.I have never ever seen dogs holding such serious,weighty conference like they did.No one would believe us but it did happen.

What the parley was,we soon got to know.Jinny got up from his place with a purposeful glint in his eyes.He marched right into the house and traipsed out with a tennis ball in his mouth.He placed the ball by the gate and nudged it with his nose so that it rolled outside and was caught promptly by Spotty.Then Jinny did something I have seldom seen any untrained dog do.He took a couple of paces back,tautened his muscles,lowered his neck and front legs and charged at the gate.When he almost reached the gate,he took a phenominal leap and landed on the other side effortlessly on his paws.It was like something out of the movie -speed,where that bus accelerates to tremendous speeds,reaches the edge ,brakes and flies over the unbuilt part. Both buddies gave us a victorious look and then galloped with the ball towards the beach.This was their plan,their little scheme.They looked so handsome,like heroes riding into the sunset as winners.

Even years later when we mentioned Spotty,Jinny's ear would perk up and he would look expectantly for his best friend.We drove down from Chennai to Bangalore when we shifted.Five of us plus Jinny in our aging Fiat car.It was a very sad cinematic scene for us to part these two great friends.Spotty ran behind the car for a long time and Jinny hung his head out of the window looking at his friend for as long as he could.I wish we had taken Spotty along with us.Today I dream of having a house full of dogs,full of frienship and love.Today I know there will always be space in my heart and my home for one more animal,for one more friend.I wish I could take that stand then.Jinny and Spotty would have enriched our lives so much more.